1,281 cases of viral fever, two of dengue confirmed

Disease surveillance stepped up in district

With the monsoon gaining strength, viral fever and other communicable diseases are on the rise in the district.

Two dengue cases and 1,281 viral fever cases were confirmed on Monday, show data from the Integrated Disease Surveillance Project. The cases include 16 of Hepatitis A, six of chickenpox, two of malaria and one of leptospirosis.

The Health Department has stepped up surveillance of diseases and field-level intervention programmes in rural and urban areas.

Visits

Officials from the public health wing visited places where the dengue cases have been reported. There are nine suspected cases.

Most of them have been reported from Thiruvambadi, Peruvannamoozhi, Kunduthode, Kunnummal, Nadapuram, Narippatta, Olavanna and Thiruvannur.

Thirty-two viral fever patients have been admitted to hospitals. As many as 23,882 patients took treatment at outpatient clinics with suspected symptoms of fever and communicable diseases.

As many as 213 patients with diarrhoea took treatment in government and private hospitals.

Meetings

District Medical Officer P.K. Mohanan said the constituency-level meetings, headed by the MLAs, were progressing in the district to identify local needs and provide immediate support. Doctors would attend the meetings and report the requirements to the department.

“We have designed a special health programme for covering regions from where the new dengue cases were reported,” Dr. Mohanan said.

“To strengthen field intervention and communicable disease control programmes during the monsoon, we have been granted Rs. 7 lakh by the government,” District Malaria Officer Vimal Raj said. Dr. Raj said Rs. 4 lakh would be utilised for communicable disease control measures and Rs. 3 lakh for the vector-borne disease control programmes.

Cases so far

So far in 2013, 43 dengue cases had been confirmed in the district. The number of confirmed leptospirosis cases reached nine, with a fresh one reported from Valiyangadi on Monday.

Till June 10, over 20 lakh people approached various hospitals in the district with communicable and non-communicable diseases. In the group, 53,610 people had viral fever and 13,729 diarrhoea. There were 1,288 Hepatitis A and 20 Hepatitis B cases.

District Medical Department records show 49 confirmed cases of malaria.